


Crown Prince

by Pretzelcoatlus



Category: Persona 4
Genre: Fluff, Gift Fic, M/M, Social Anxiety, little bit of whinging at the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-13
Updated: 2014-02-13
Packaged: 2018-01-12 05:21:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1182399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pretzelcoatlus/pseuds/Pretzelcoatlus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yosuke falls victim to the pervasive flower crown fad.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Crown Prince

**Author's Note:**

> I must have been working on this for months, I promised this to a friend of mine (hairclipz on tumblr) and slacked off for months haha whoops ;u;

Desperate for some time to relax between their investigations and their schoolwork, Yosuke and Souji lay sprawled, mindlessly, on their backs on the hill leading down to the Samegawa riverbed, their schoolbags dropped lazily next to themselves and Yosuke’s bike chained and leaning precariously against one of the dusty, sunbaked bike racks near the gazebo. Their bodies were slightly tipped in relation to each other rather than forming a closer parallel line so that their heads brushed together at a rough forty-five-degree angle, making it harder to for the earphones they shared to be yanked out—Yosuke, being Yosuke, found a way to yank them out accidentally all the time, of course. Souji didn’t care much, though his ear was getting rubbed a little raw by Yosuke’s constant fidgeting and tugging; he was calm, but _really_ calm this time, not I’m-the-leader-and-I-can’t-look-like-I-want-to-vomit-and-cry-even-though-I-actually-want-to-do-that-all-the-time calm. Yosuke wasn’t, but that was a given—a natural state of being that soothed Souji in its own way. He didn’t pick up on the nervous energies of people too well, though he understood them. As long as everything was going as expected, no matter how unpleasant those things may be, Souji was collected.

“Are you bored?” Yosuke piped up, their hair brushing together as he tipped his head up to look at Souji’s jaw, trying to see his eyes. “I’m sorry if you’re bored.”

“I’m fine,” answered Souji, fiddling with a flower in his hands, rubbing a sunset-colored petal between his fingers. It was an orange cosmos, plucked from a newly tilled flowerbed that lay next to them on the slope leading down to the river. The area had always been muddy and dreary looking, and the city beautification committee planted the brightly-colored assortment of wildflowers above the floodline to lighten the place up a little. (The fact that many of them were red and orange, the characteristic colors of the encroaching Junes franchise, brewed some gossip about Junes’ influence on the local government; Yosuke couldn’t even bother to be boggled by it.)

“You sure? We can go to my room and play a video game or something.”

“I’m fine right here.”

“We don’t have to listen to my music! We can listen to yours…”

“I like your music just fine.”

Yosuke twitched.

“I mean fine as in it’s nice and I enjoy it, Yosuke.”

Yosuke snorted, bony body sagging against the grass. The pliable soil was easy on his mismatched shoulder blades, cool and soothing.

“You’re hard to read,” Yosuke said fondly.

“And you’re neurotic.”

A sharp, singular laugh escaped the brown-haired boy and a held breath was let go, letting him sink further into the soil.

“You’re right. You’re totally right.” Yosuke’s cheek fell to the grass and his eyes followed the path of the tendons of Souji’s throat to the clavicle, shaded heavily under the popped collar of his shirt. Yosuke swallowed, smiling again.

“Totally right.” Yosuke stared at the grass.

Another quiet moment passed between them with a heavy bassline thrumming in their ears and another wildflower was plucked from the grass, its stem woven listlessly into a knot with the previous one. As Souji threaded a third stem into the knot, adding a ring of gentle white petals to two orange cosmos, a louder song began to play—a song infinitely more grating on the ears with a squealing guitar and an overzealous singer, and Souji responded with a squint of his eyes. Yosuke jumped, flushing, sputtering, fumbling for the music player.

“Sorry! Sorry, this one’s really bad; I don’t know why I have it on here-!”

Souji dropped the slowly forming crown onto his belly and reached out a hand to grab Yosuke’s wrist. Yosuke’s pulse jumped into Souji’s fingers and he froze, fingers clenched into claws with his knuckles bent at hard angles, and Souji regretted doing that—the shadow world had made them all jumpy, and with Yosuke’s wide, dilated eyes and tightened muscle, Souji knew he’d been too brash. He rubbed his thumb over Yosuke’s risen veins.

“Remember why we’re here,” he gently commanded, and Yosuke laughed it off again, embarrassed. That’s right—they were here to relax. Their brush with the Kubo kid, disturbing as it was, had left everyone a little frazzled. Even though his capture and incarceration had been a welcome relief to all of them, it felt like it’d happened all too soon, and that it was all too easy.

Yosuke’s skin was clammy. Souji unclenched his hand and Yosuke pushed his wrist back into his palm, but Souji failed to notice. Yosuke rolled completely onto his side, watching Souji work on his flower crown, and caught himself before he teased Souji, knowing he’d regret it immediately. Souji was the one to speak first this time.

“I like this song, actually,” he said, delicately weaving the flowers together to the beat of the death metal blaring in their ears.

“Really? But it’s so… y’know. Not like something you’d listen to.” Yosuke shrugged with one shoulder.

“What do you think I would listen to?” Souji said, with a challenging grin.

“I dunno! Ambient stuff, deep stuff, classical. You seem like a guy who knows what opera’s about.”

“Lord, no. I like, uh, the Flower Duet, I guess, and Ave Maria, but that’s about it. I play classical music, but I don’t get it.”

“ _Abe Malia,_ ” Yosuke repeated. “ _Fuawa Duetto_.”

“Your pronunciation is terrible.”

“Shut up!”

Souji laughed and it was crisp, but it ended with a snort, and Souji appeared to be a lot more natural in Yosuke’s eyes. He sat up, grass falling from his hair and sticking to his sweat-dampened back. He held up the crown so that it ringed around the sun, the crown’s rusty autumn colors complimenting the sun’s fat yellow glare, and he had to squint.

“Yup,” he said, nodding decisively. “Perfect.” He dropped it on Yosuke’s face. Yosuke’s features were pinched and centered within the crown and he crammed his eyes shut, leaves tickling his face.

“Dude!” Yosuke sputtered, the taste of fresh dirt on his lips and tongue. He batted at the crown, sending it flying onto his lap; when he found Souji staring down at him, and the crown sagging between his thighs in dejection, he felt a twinge of guilt and picked it up gently. Yosuke held it in his open palms, a thumb absently tracing over the knot between an orange bloom and a white one. They weren’t much like the flower crowns he usually saw in pictures of pretty girls on the internet; this one was more basic, less froofy and delicate, with thick stems and simple, everyday flowers instead of lilies, roses, that sort of thing.

“Put it on,” said Souji. Yosuke glowered at him, but Souji returned his stare without faltering.

“I’m not wearing a flower crown, dude,” said Yosuke, nearly pouting. “Isn’t—isn’t this sort of thing for Nanako? For little girls?”

Souji shrugged, turning his attention to the river, resting his chin on his hand and his elbow on his arm. “If that’s what you think. But it’s just flowers.”

Yosuke’s fingers curled around his gift, and he sighed very loudly, _ensuring_ that Souji knew he didn’t approve, and he lifted it above his head, letting it drop daintily onto his grass-tangled head.  
  
“ _Theeere_ we go, Your Highness, Prince of Fairies.” Yosuke extended his arms above him, twirling his hands with a sarcastic flourish. Souji looked at him, cheek still pressed against his hand, and he smiled fondly, pushing his eyes into a squint as though that slight grin were testing the structural integrity of his face.

“It’s nice,” Souji said, warm and soft like the twilight sun burning freckles into Yosuke’s cheeks. “It suits you.”

“Like _how_?”

Yosuke snorted, hunching over in embarrassment, eyebrows narrowed and lips pulled into a long, flat line. He flinched when Souji reached out to touch the crown, inadvertently brushing his cool fingers along Yosuke’s burning ear, again dislodging the earphone that still clung for dear life inside it. Yosuke remained frozen, like a strange animal were sniffing him, as Souji touched his hair, adjusting the crown to sit better on his head, tilting up the front to pull back Yosuke’s fringe to reveal more of his embarrassment-crinkled face.

“The colors fit you nicely,” Souji said, tucking a lock of hair behind Yosuke’s ear. “And long hair always looks good with flower crowns. You look sweet, and kind, even with that grimace of yours.”

“I’m—That’s—I’m not grimacing!”

“Well, you’re panicking now, so you’re right.”

Yosuke groaned and gave up. Souji laughed, letting his hand fall down the slope of Yosuke’s neck and back before it fell away entirely.

“… I really look good in it?” Yosuke muttered.

“Of course,” Souji chuckled, patting his back. “Really. I’m not doing it to make fun of you or humiliate you or take pictures of you.”

“That… was specific.”

“Honest, you look nice, Yosuke. Really.”

Yosuke was inclined to believe him with that tone of his, and he hugged his knees to his chest, doing his best to still look irritated, but the schoolgirl smile overpowered him.

“H-hey, Souji—”

“Big Bro!”

Yosuke never thought he would be scared by Nanako, but he’d never heard her shout so loudly, even in Junes while chasing Teddie around, and he ducked and rolled some way down the hill, dislodging his flower crown, and saving himself at an angle awkward enough to allow him to see the young girl folding her dress neatly around her knees and kneeling next to Souji, who regards her with a pleasantly surprised smile. Yosuke, even with his heart pounding, found himself smiling too; and a bit relieved.

“Nanako,” Souji said fondly, stretching his legs out on the grass. “What are you doing here?”

“Sometimes I walk by here on the way home to look at the ducks,” she replied, setting down her backpack. “And I ended up finding Big Bro and Yosuke!”

“Look at you,” Yosuke crooned. “Walking home all by yourself. Doesn’t Souji come by to pick you up?”

“Sometimes.”

“How cruel,” Yosuke teased, grinning at Souji. “Letting a little girl walk home alone… you’re a heartbreaker after all, Souji.”

“She was walking home by herself before I showed up…” Souji muttered, turning up his nose.

“Yeah,” Nanako nodded, chest puffing out with a bit of pride. “Big Bro usually picks me up on Saturdays so we can go to Duck Burger, but he said that someone he _really_ liked wanted to spend some time with him. So, I told Big Bro it was okay.”

The silence, unnoticed by Nanako, hung heavily between Yosuke and Souji; the former gaped a little bit, turning to face the man of the hour, whose nostrils had flared and whose ears had turned red at the tips. Souji stared straight ahead into the horizon beyond the bridge with the calm, grim expression of someone awaiting his execution. Yosuke leaned forward surreptitiously, leaning on his palms in the grass.

“Dude, did you really—”

“Nanako, do you want me to make you a flower crown?”

Yosuke was entirely unwilling to let this die, but Souji immediately set to work. Nanako’s eyes brightened; Yosuke lost his train of thought.

“Yeah!”

Nanako scurried to her brother to lean on his shoulder, looking over him at the flowers he was rummaging through.

“What colors do you want?”

“I don’t see any pink ones…”

“Yeah, me neither.”

Yosuke sat back more comfortably in the grass, his hand brushing the crown that had fallen off his head before. He took it into his hands, turning it over—the petals were flecked with dark soil now, and it had dented from the fall. He wondered if Nanako had paraphrased.

“There we are.”

Yosuke had spaced out longer than he realized, the sun bearing down at his middle back now. Nanako’s crown was all white, with the tiniest pink blooms, and Souji had taken the time to slip a few into her hair ties so that they sat perkily upon her pigtails. She had her own crown in her lap, a more rudimentary one, made with any color she felt like—Souji watched her raptly, his chin in his hands like before, when Yosuke felt the touch of his cool fingers on his forehead. Souji twirled a flower in his hands absently, curling the stem around his ring finger and holding the orange cosmos bloom between his ring and pinky finger and untangling it again.

Yosuke scooted closer to them with his heels, feeling too distant.

“So a crown makes you a princess, right?” Nanako asked, lips pursed in concentration.

“Sure does,” Souji replied.

“And it can make you a prince too?”

“Definitely.”

“Here, then.”

Nanako, now finished, rose to her knees, shuffling over to her brother with a penguin-like waddle. Souji bowed his head to her, closing his eyes respectfully as she crowned him with a hodgepodge of reds and yellows and whites and purples—regal colors.

“Then you’re the prince and I’m the princess,” Nanako declared, hands on her hips. “We’re going to get married and be king and queen.”

Yosuke sorted, and it sounded more derisive than he would have liked, but thankfully Nanako didn’t seem to notice.

“Is that so?” Souji chuckled. He straightens his back and opens his posture, still holding the curled flower in his lap. “Well, what about Yosuke? He has a crown too.”

“Oh! He does!” Nanako turns to him, scooting closer to get a look at it. “Then he’s a prince, too. Of another kingdom, maybe.”

“He could be the court jester,” suggested Souji. Yosuke glared.

“What kind of jester wears a crown?!”

“No, I think he’s better as a prince. Prince of Junes Kingdom!”

Yosuke shakes his head, grinning.

“Please, that’s the last place I’d wanna be prince of. Shouldn’t you be in the Junes Kingdom? That way you could live there.”

“Oh!” Nanako claps her hands together. “Yeah! I’m the Junes Kingdom princess, then. Souji lives there too. He can cook the food.”

“Wouldn’t we have cooks for that?”

“Hey dude, if you’re not gonna walk the princess home you could at least cook for her! What do you want the prince to cook for you, Nanako?”

“Omurice!”

“Don’t encourage her, Yosuke—”

“You heard Your Highness, she wants omurice!”

Nanako burst into giggles. Yosuke jumped to his feet, scooping Nanako up and hoisting her onto his shoulders.

“Omurice! Omurice! Omurice!” they chanted, starting the wobbly journey up the side of the hill towards the bike racks. “Omurice! Omurice! Omurice!”

Nanako punched her fist into the air in time with Yosuke’s clumsy march. Yosuke looked back once he reached stable ground, finding Souji shaking his head with an amused smile and carrying their bags for them.

 

“Sorry for making you do this,” Yosuke said, lifting himself by skinny arms onto the counter next to Souji’s bowls and plates. Souji smiled, keeping his eyes focused on the skillet in front of him as he sifted through the rice and corn to check the color of the diced chicken grilling within. Nanako sat cross-legged in front of the television, hypnotized.

“She’s been talking about omurice for weeks,” he said with a shrug. “Besides, it’s nice to have company over for dinner.”

“Oh, dude, you don’t have to cook for me!” Yosuke rubbed the back of his neck; his skin was hot to the touch, but not sunburned. “Really, I’m cool with just sticking around while you guys eat.”

“I didn’t say I was cooking for you.”

“O-oh, sorry for assuming…”

“I’m kidding. Of course I’m going to cook for you.”

Yosuke sighed. “You enjoy doing that, don’t you?”

“Doing what?”

“Messing with me.”

“Maybe a little, but it’s not like I do it all the time. You just assume I’m messing with you.”

“Ah.”

A silence fell, not entirely uncomfortable, and Yosuke tipped his cup of juice into his mouth. The blaring television and sizzle-pop of the fried rice occupied the space once held by conversation—Yosuke is lost momentarily in those sounds, watching Nanako in her act of watching, and he forgot that this wasn’t this house and that he didn’t come here every day. He had always been a visitor, to his friends, to Inaba, but never felt that way here—well, save for those times when Dojima was home and humorlessly asking him about how his sword collection was going.

“So what did you want to say to me earlier?”

Yosuke forced a hard swallow. “What?”

“You were about to say something to me before Nanako found us. It sounded important.”

“Oh. Right…”

Yosuke had nearly forgotten about it himself.

“To be honest, I… didn’t really know what I was gonna say. It was just kinda coming out of my mouth.” He chuckled weakly. “You know how it goes with me.”

“Is that so?”

“Yeah! I’m—I’m not lying, I really didn’t know.”

“Never said you were.”

Yosuke punched Souji’s shoulder without thinking. Souji didn’t respond besides grinning.

“I guess I was going to say something, like… embarrassing, probably.”

“Probably.”

“Yeah.”

“Nanako can’t hear us. Even if she did, she wouldn’t care. Go ahead and shoot.”

“Well, you ever get the feeling—when you’re with somebody—you feel really safe, but also really scared at the same time?”

Souji’s wooden spatula paused in the skillet, letting the rice simmer around it.

“I don’t know, it’s weird. Like you said before, I just—I just assume you’re messing with me. I guess it’s because I can’t believe you actually… like me?”

Souji turned to Yosuke like he were an ambushing Shadow, all seriousness, creased between the eyebrows, ready to speak.

“No, no, it’s—you aren’t doing anything, and I’m not trying to make you feel bad! It’s just… weird, you know, because I like being around you, but I’m also scared. All the time. Like at any minute I’m going to screw up and you’re going to be gone.”

Yosuke said too much, and he clenched his hands, lifting his drink to his mouth to keep it shut.

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“Except back to the city,” Yosuke snorted. He didn’t dare meet Souji’s eyes.

“See? See? It’s—it’s stuff like that, Souji. God. I don’t know how you put up with me.”

A weight settled on Yosuke’s head. He looked up to see an orange cosmos sagging into his vision, making his eyes cross, and the flash of Souji’s pale fingertips.

“I’ve stuck around through all the dumb things you’ve said before,” Souji said plainly. “That’s not changing.”

Nanako sung along to a commercial jingle, and Yosuke’s heart settled in relief, but kept sinking, dropping to the bottom rungs of his ribs.

“But you don’t have to leave to hate me,” Yosuke said, and smelled alcohol though there was none.

Souji pulled Yosuke off the counter, and Yosuke’s feet failed him though they were flat on the ground, and he almost buckled but Souji held him up with one arm, stupidly strong, and tugged their mismatched bodies together. Souji still faced the skillet, still looked down, still said nothing, but his arm slipped into the sharp curve of Yosuke’s waist and held tight, their chests half-pressed together. Souji was taller—Yosuke’s cheek was squished against his shoulder, skull slotted against Souji’s jaw and neck, his wilting flower crown knocked askew and hanging over his ear. The weight of Souji’s tilted head pressed the drying stems into Yosuke’s scalp.

Souji kept cooking. Yosuke watched a watery, abstract television screen over Souji’s shoulder and was not let go.

 

Yosuke’s calves felt heavy when he gathered his things and buttoned up his coat and stood noncommittally near the door, waiting for an order to leave. He held his bag but did not sling it over his shoulder. His flower crown still sat crookedly on his head. His brain was sluggish and his stomach was full of fried rice and egg and he felt warm inside but cold outside.

“Want me to walk you home halfway?”

Yosuke nodded so quickly he nearly dislocated his neck.

Souji locked the door securely, reminding Nanako again and again to not answer it. Nanako broke out anyway to chase after them, pushing a baggie of leftovers into Yosuke’s hands. Souji nagged her; it was cute.

Yosuke walked his bike, still clenching the warm plastic bag around one of the handlebars—he let one hand hang free between the two of them, arm bowed around his messenger bag. Their knuckles brushed together, sometimes deliberately. They shared earphones. Yosuke didn’t dare touch his music player, not even to skip the anime openings.

They stopped at a corner near Junes, a streetlight pouring sickly yellow light in a conical shower down upon them.  

“This is it,” Yosuke breathed. “Thanks. I probably would have attempted to ride home in the dark if you didn’t come with me.”

“That would have been a tragedy,” Souji laughed. “Thanks for coming over. Nanako doesn’t really like to play like that much with anyone, so it was nice to see.”

“Don’t mention it, it was fun! She’s still a kid, after all. Gotta have fun with ‘em while they can. Soon enough she’s going to be chasing you down for a real proposal, right?”

Souji rolled his eyes. “I don’t think so. She’ll find someone else.”

Souji lifted Yosuke’s crown, settling it more securely and evenly on his head, smoothing his hair and flipping it at the ends, pushing those unruly bangs out of Yosuke’s heat-blasted face. Souji smiled fondly, reaching into his pocket with one hand and darting out to grab Yosuke’s clammy palm on the other, slipping something onto his ring finger. Yosuke, tongue-tied, lifted his hand to his face, splaying out his fingers—bound around his finger was a tightly knotted flower ring, a slightly crinkled orange cosmos bloom sitting in the center like a costume jewel.

“I have my own prince in waiting anyway,” said Souji, flashing teeth for the first time in recent memory before turning and beating a hasty, clumsy retreat back home.

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Valentine's Day!


End file.
